Colours Red, Green, and Everything in Between

This book is a memoir stitched from the author's journeys across India, China and Southeast Asia. It carries the reader from the Bay of Bengal to Yangtze River to the straits of Malacca. It explores quest and connections: The giant wild goose pagoda in Xian to the grottoes of Longmen, the temples of Shaolin to the shrines of Bali. Along the way appear house helpers and local markets, lion and tiger dancers, ancestor worship and ghost appeasement, masks and kites, pets and puppets.

Some stories move between grief and laughter as the author encounters food and language issues which she sorts out over a period, thus making the everyday life luminous. Her visits to various museums across Asia not only provides a sincere source of information about a country's cultural past, it ferments the tapestry of history in it's true sense while a personal loss propels her to embark on a pilgrimage to Mount Kailash which teaches her a few life lessons.

Living in India and China and discovering the two countries in Malaysia emerge as the memoir's beating heart. Shanghai's riverfront glitters with neon, yet alleyways still carry the smell of steamed buns and whisper of karma chants. In Kuala Lumpur, red lanterns hang beside flower rangoli and the rhythm of Indian and Chinese festivals pulse through local streets and malls. For the author, these are not just images of travel but layered encounters-fragments of history, migration and celebration that speak to the ways cultures echo and entwine.

At its heart, Colours Red, Green and Everything In-between is about migration and adaptation, about carrying pieces of India into China and Malaysia, and recognising the essence of home in unfamiliar places.

ACT India: Ms. Nilanjana Das, Director and Chairperson, who helped us structure this book, and came forward enthusiastically to discuss the book's proposal at its initial stage, despite the lockdown challenges in India.

Asha Zurich Foundation: Dr. Pratyush Das Kanungo, Project Lead and Coordinator for outreach activities, Dr. Rajdeep Deb, President of the organization; and Dr. Sampada Bodke, Project Lead, for supporting this project and coming forward to collaborate for this book.

Humane Warriors: Dr. Naveen Shamsudhin and Dr. Rhythima Shinde, Founders, who were active during the Covid-19, with their Humane Warriors team supporting the daily wage workers across India. Despite a time-crunch they contributed to this book with their timely inputs.

Protsaah - Handcrafted Peace: Ms. Saloni Duggal Sreshtha, Director, who was in India to meet her artisans and was unable to fly back to Zurich due to the lockdown for a long time, despite that she took the time to contribute to this book and raise awareness for the cause.

Rice Mill Social Enterprise: Ms. Ruth Mumba, Director, and Abundance Foundation's Co-Founder Dr. Deepa Pullanikkatil who came forward to contribute to this book with their newly found project in South Africa.

Touching Heart: Ms. Helen Yi, Founder and Project Lead Ms. Sumona Das, who relentlessly worked on different projects and produced hundreds of facemasks herself to combat the pandemic in the USA; helped us get the Founder's interview for this book.

Ushthi Foundation: Ms. Olga Egli, PR and Fundraising Director, who contributed with her inputs, and contacted the Founder Mr. Kurt Büuuml;rki and the Executive Director Ms. Alessandra Grosse for the interview in this book; and Ms. Mirjam Hirzel, International Project Coordinator, for her valuable thoughts and inputs.